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| Marcus Ericsson continued the trend of new winners in race one |
Marcus Ericsson was one of the few men smiling after the first Belle Isle race on Saturday, as the Swede picked up his first career IndyCar victory. It was Ericsson's 37th start and it came at the track of his only other podium finish. He was second to Scott Dixon in the second Belle Isle race two years ago. It is Ericsson's first victory in 2,898 days. His last victory was the GP2 feature race at the Nürburgring on July 6, 2013. This is the fourth different first-time winner this season and Ericsson is the seventh different winner through the first seven races. This is also the first time Chip Ganassi Racing has had three different winners in a season. Ericsson set a career-high for laps led yesterday. He led all of five laps, inflating his career total to 15 laps led. Ericsson won from 15th on the grid in race one. It was the fourth time a Belle Isle winner started outside the top ten in 28 races.
Rinus VeeKay ended up second in his first Belle Isle start. VeeKay's previous best finish on a street course was ninth at St. Petersburg in April. He is one of two drivers to finish in the top ten of six of seven races this season. Scott Dixon is the other. VeeKay is the first Ed Carpenter Racing with multiple podium finishes in a season since J.R. Hildebrand was third at Phoenix and second at Iowa in 2017.
Patricio O'Ward has three podium finishes and five top five finishes after his third-place result yesterday. O'Ward leads all drivers in top five finishes this season. He also picked up his second pole position of the season ahead of race one. O'Ward is tied for the second-best average finish this season, as he and Álex Palou have each averaged a seventh-place finish. Scott Dixon leads the way at 6.7143.
Takuma Sato scored his first top five finishes in 12 starts with his fourth-place result in race one. It was Sato's fifth top five finish at Belle Isle. It has lifted him into the top ten of the championship and Sato is the top driver without a victory this season. If there is a new winner in the second Belle Isle race, it would be the first time a season opened with eight different winners since 1911.
Graham Rahal joined his teammate Sato in the top five with Rahal in fifth. It was Rahal's fourth top five finish of the season. He has four consecutive top ten finishes at Belle Isle and six top ten finishes in his last seven Belle Isle starts.
Santino Ferrucci picked up his best street course finish in sixth. Ferrucci's previous best was ninth at St. Petersburg in 2019. He also finished sixth at Indianapolis and he is looking for three consecutive top ten finishes for only the second time in his career. He was ninth in the Grand Prix of Indianapolis last year ahead of a pair of sixth place finishes at the Road America doubleheader.
Ferrucci is one of ten drivers in this race without an IndyCar victory. The last time there were five first-time winners in a season was the 2002 Indy Racing League season when Jeff Ward, Airton Daré, Alex Barron, Tomas Scheckter and Felipe Giaffone all won a race. It was the only victory for three of those five drivers.
Alexander Rossi was seventh in race one, but he did lead his first laps of the season after starting second. Rossi has started on the front row of four consecutive Belle Isle races now. Rossi has not finished in the top five and yet he has been the top Andretti Autosport finisher in four of seven races this season. Andretti Autosport has not had a top five finisher in the last three races. The team had the same streak last year between the Iowa doubleheader and the Indianapolis 500. This is Rossi's longest top five drought since his rookie season when he went nine races between top five finishes.
Scott Dixon was eighth and he has six top ten finishes from seven races. Dixon led 16 laps yesterday and he has led 395 laps this season. He has not led 400 laps in a season since 2012, when he led 456 laps. The most laps he has led in a season was 899 laps in 2008.
Ed Jones ended up ninth yesterday, his first top ten finish in 14 starts dating back to a sixth-place finish in the 2019 Grand Prix of Indianapolis. Jones led two laps yesterday and they are only the second and third laps led of his career. He led one lap at Texas in 2018, a race where he also finished ninth.
Josef Newgarden was the top Team Penske finisher in race one in tenth. Team Penske had at least one top five finisher in ninth consecutive races before yesterday. Team Penske had put at least one car on the podium in the previous three Belle Isle races before yesterday. Newgarden did pick up fastest lap in race one, his first fastest lap since his Iowa victory last year.
Sébastien Bourdais was 11th in race one, snapping a streak of four consecutive finishes outside the top fifteen. It was the fourth time in the last five Belle Isle races Bourdais has finished outside the top ten. Bourdais has won the eighth race of the season three times in his career, most recently in 2015 at Belle Isle.
Simon Pagenaud fell to 12th in the closing stages of race one. Twelfth is Pagenaud's worst finish this season. Among the 21 drivers that have run every race this season, Pagenaud has the best worst finish this season. The other 20 full-time drivers have finished at least one race outside the top twelve.
Conor Daly was 13th for his second consecutive start on Saturday. Daly has not had a top ten finish in his last 12 starts and he has still not been the top Ed Carpenter Racing finisher in his season-and-a-half with the team.
Colton Herta has finished outside the top ten in his last three starts and in five of seven races this season. This is the first time Herta has finished outside the top ten in three consecutive races since a seven-race slump in his rookie season two years ago.
Álex Palou's races led streak ended yesterday at six. Palou was 15th, but he retains the championship on 263 points, 15 points ahead of O'Ward. Palou has not finished in the top ten yet on a street course in his IndyCar career. Yesterday was only his third street course start.
The good news for Jack Harvey is for the second consecutive race he finished ahead of his starting position. The bad news is Harvey only went from 19th to 16th in race one. For the second consecutive season, Harvey has a four-race stretch of finishes outside the top fifteen. He was outside the top fifteen in the first four races of the 2020 season.
James Hinchcliffe was looking at a possible top five finisher before needing to pit for emergency service under the red flag yesterday. This dropped Hinchcliffe out of the running, and he ended up 17th, which actually matched the best finish of his season.
Dalton Kellett matched his career best finish of 18th yesterday, but he finished one lap down. Kellett is the worst driver in the championship to have started every race in 26th on 74 points. He is five points behind Tony Kanaan, who has only started three races.
Scott McLaughlin had his hands full and brought the car home in 19th. McLaughlin started a career-worst 23rd in race one. His previous worst was 21st on debut at St. Petersburg last year.
Will Power suffered a crushing defeat yesterday when his car would not start when the red flag was lifted, and Power was leading the race at the time. Power has finished outside the top ten in five consecutive races, his worst slump since he ended 2016 with a pair of 20th-place finishes and opened 2017 with finishes of 19th, 13th and 14th. Power did lead 37 laps yesterday, the most laps he has ever led in a Belle Isle race.
Ryan Hunter-Reay snapped a streak of four consecutive top five finishes at Belle Isle after he slapped the wall on an out lap after his first pit stop. It was Hunter-Reay's worst finish at Belle Isle in 21st. He has finished in the top ten in the eighth race of the season the last three years.
Max Chilton was 22nd and he has finished outside the top twenty in three consecutive races. Chilton did start 18th, his best starting position of the season. He has started outside the top fifteen in seven of nine Belle Isle starts.
Romain Grosjean's accident in turn eight left him with his first retirement of his IndyCar career. Grosjean did lead a lap for a second consecutive start. He did start third in race one, his second consecutive top five start.
Jimmie Johnson suffered a sensor issue in the first race and only completed 49 of 70 laps. Johnson did win one NASCAR Cup Series race on June 13. It came at Pocono in 2004. He led 126 of 200 laps that day. His only other Cup start on June 13 was at Michigan in 2010. He ended up sixth.
Felix Rosenqvist stayed overnight at DMC Detroit Receiving Hospital. Evaluation revealed no life or limb threatening injuries and Rosenqvist remained awake and alert the entire time. Rosenqvist did post a message on Twitter last night saying he was ok, except for soreness.
Oliver Askew has been called in to substitute for Rosenqvist in race two. Askew made 12 starts in the #7 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet last season. His best finish was third in the first Iowa race, but his best finish on a road/street course was 15th in the first Road America race and the second Mid-Ohio race.
Qualifying for race two takes place at 9:00 a.m. ET. The qualifying groups will flip their order from race one.
Group one will be Bourdais, Dixon, Herta, Newgarden, Hunter-Reay, Sato, Askew, Rahal, Chilton, Jones, Ferrucci and McLaughlin.
Group two has Power, O'Ward, Rossi, Ericsson, VeeKay, Hinchcliffe, Grosjean, Palou, Daly, Pagenaud, Harvey, Kellett and Johnson.
As with race one, the top six drivers from each group will advance into round two, where the top driver will earn pole position.
NBC's coverage of the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix race two begins at noon ET with green flag scheduled for 12:40 p.m. ET. The race is scheduled for 70 laps.
